Friday, January 16, 2009

Bush bids us a flawed farewell

President Bush delivered his final farewell last night. It was basically a big pile of what he's been shoveling on his legacy tour the past few weeks. Several people have picked it apart, but for me, there was one point that summed it up.

First, you didn't receive a briefing every morning. I learned this when it was reported that Obama was being briefed every day (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/12/03/obama-receiving-more-dail_n_147956.html) (for real). You just told Brit Hume you skipped Sundays. (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,479174,00.html) Are there no mornings on Sunday? Call it a lie. Call it an oversight. Call it spin. Doesn't matter. There is only one truth, and according to you, that wasn't it.

Second, the President is supposed to receive an intelligence briefing every morning. It's called the President's Daily Brief (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President%27s_Daily_Brief). It started in 1961. Weren't you getting those before 9/11? Was that an example of how your life changed, or just a weird linguistic inverse where you follow a statement with opposite examples?

From these few sentences, the essence of the Bush presidency can be drawn. Believe Bush on Sunday, then he was lying last night. Believe daily briefings were a way his life changed after 9/11, then he neglected his duties before 9/11. Lying or negligent, those are the options this president has presented us. It's no different than he's done during his term. No surprise he's saying farewell the same way.[+/-] Hide/Show Text[+/-] Hide/Show Text